{"id":3581,"date":"2026-08-18T02:14:56","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T06:14:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/?p=3581"},"modified":"2026-08-18T02:14:56","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T06:14:56","slug":"michigan-america-is-not-for-sale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/?p=3581","title":{"rendered":"Michigan\/America Is Not For Sale"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/media-library\/abdul-el-sayed-addresses-supporters-on-election-night.jpg?id=67577490&amp;width=1200&amp;height=800&amp;coordinates=382,0,383,0\"><\/p>\n<p>Wowza, rare glimmer of good news. We take a moment to honor the stunning Michigan victory of Abdul El-Sayed, who was outspent 12-1 by his opponent&#8217;s millions from establishment Dems, Zionist PACS and corporations and still managed to win even though he is a progressive Muslim who calls genocide genocide and wants Medicare for all in a Trump state that isn&#8217;t communist New York. Ha. What millions in dark money buys you these days: &#8220;Sweet fuck all, as it turns out.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>El-Sayed&#8217;s inspiring win <a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/news\/el-sayed-michiga...\" target=\"_blank\">came<\/a> against a candidate, Haley Stevens, who was bankrolled by over $60 million from party leaders and outside money from a murky nesting doll of super-PACS and shell corporations but whose campaign still had the audacity to bill her as \u201cthe grassroots choice of Michigan working families.\u201d Total spending on the race in a key swing state was about $80 million, most from fat cats, making it &#8220;the fattest cat in the history of primaries.&#8221; El-Sayed reportedly got about $4.6 million in <a href=\"https:\/\/substack.com\/redirect\/26272906-a478-402d-a6fc-b71e3c9bd31c?j=eyJ1IjoibDhod24ifQ.5jEjeLiJZS5OfHG4v_xEBlfZCsRwcX2P4Vv9vuux9BQ\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">outside <\/a>money; Stevens and Netanyahu got about $60 million, the plurality of it from AIPAC&#8217;s United Democracy Project (sic) super PAC &#8211; the most they&#8217;ve dumped into a single race, making it what observers call AIPAC&#8217;s biggest defeat. From <em>I Fucking Love Australia<\/em>: AIPAC shoved 30 million dollars up Michigan&#8217;s arse, and Michigan shat it straight back out.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Born in Detroit in 1984, Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed was raised by his father Mohamed, an Egyptian immigrant, and his stepmother Jackie, whose Michigan roots go back to the 1800s. After graduating from the University of Michigan Phi Beta Kappa, he earned an MD from Columbia and a doctorate in public health from Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, worked as an epidemiologist and became the youngest health official in a major American city when he was appointed Director of Detroit&#8217;s Health Department, gutted rwhen it was privatized during the city\u2019s bankruptcy,  at age 30. Rebuilding it, he went after corporate polluters, stripped lead out of schools, starting offering free glasses to kids in need, expanded Narcan access, and spearheaded a program cancelling up to $700 million in medical debt for 300,000 state residents.<\/p>\n<p>Faced with that resume, AIPAC spent their millions on an ad blitz that managed not to mention any of his policies, or even Israel, though he won the first-ever political <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2026\/06\/29\/abdul-el-sayed-jewish-voice-peace-senate\/\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\"> endorsement<\/a> from <em>Jewish Voice For Peace.<\/em> Instead, they focused on the issues that really matter: They attacked El-Sayed for criticizing the Obamas, allegedly helping Trump win, and sitting for an interview with a streamer they don\u2019t like, Hasan Piker. If he wins the general election against the GOP&#8217;s carpetbagging empty suit Mike Rogers, he&#8217;d become the first Muslim in the Senate. His longtime <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/news\/the-new-yorker-interview\/abdul-el-sayeds-argument-for-america-and-against-his-own-party\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">message <\/a>to Dems: Stop compromising, ban ICE, end sending arms to Israel, Medicare for All, no more forever wars, get dark money out of politics. On election night, at a podium reading, &#8220;MIchigan Is Not For Sale,&#8221; he celebrated &#8220;the movement we were able to inspire,&#8221; and &#8220;the idea that we could take our government back.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>El-Sayed&#8217;s victory, while slimmer than predicted, was seen as pivotal; noted Bernie Sanders, &#8220;This is an election between Abdul and the <a href=\"https:\/\/robertreich.substack.com\/p\/the-real-meaning-of-el-sayeds-victory\" target=\"_blank\">billionaire class<\/a>.\u201d And the candidate the establishment called &#8220;unelectable&#8221; won with the endorsement of the United Auto Workers, &#8220;the beating heart of Michigan labor.&#8221; His win was the biggest but not the only news out of Michigan: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.commondreams.org\/tag\/sunrise-movement\" target=\"_self\">Sunrise Movement<\/a> co-founder <strong><\/strong>and data center opponent William Lawrence also took the primary for Michigan\u2019s 7th Congressional district. They join progressive wins elsewhere: Zohran Mamdani in New York. Katie Wilson in Seattle. Three Mamdani-backed candidates in New York primaries, two against longtime incumbents. Melat Kiros in Colorado. Troy Jackson in Maine. It&#8217;s still a long tough road ahead. But take heart from spineless ghoul Mike Johnson: \u201cThe insurgent left is on the rise.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Wowza, rare glimmer of good news. We take a moment to honor the stunning Michigan victory of Abdul El-Sayed, who was outspent 12-1 by his opponent&#8217;s millions from establishment Dems, Zionist PACS and corporations and still managed to win even though he is a progressive Muslim who calls genocide genocide and wants Medicare for all [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"registered_only","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[742],"class_list":["post-3581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ciencia-y-tecnologia","tag-vr-news-net"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3581"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3581\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vr-news.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}